Friday, August 28, 2009

Alfred Hitchcock held that a director or a scriptwriter has to use as many elements of a city as possible to "earn" the right to use that city in a film. So a movie shot in Switzerland must contain Swiss food, watches, chocolate etc. as key plot devices. While that may have worked for his films, I'm really tired of seeing the same things whenever a photographer/director decides to shoot in my home town, Istanbul using the city as a theme. Especially fashion shoots are guilty of squeezing Turkish textiles, tea, coffee, simit, food, anything Ottoman or early 20th century into a single frame. I have to praise Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott for breaking the cycle with their Istanbul photoshoot for W Magazine. They did a great job of just focusing on certain architectural shapes and juxtaposing them with beautifully shaped clothes.

(They then contradicted this shoot with a Kate Moss as harem-girl shoot in a Turkish bath but I have to forgive this slight because the photos are so gorgeous and lively.)

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Apparently the Soviets had a thing for Mayan culture! (I'm guessing they idealized the Mayans as a pre-colonial, pre-capitalist peasant culture, just as the Mexican revolution did. ) One of the few playing card motifs available during the Soviet era, the Mayan playing cards are fascinating.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

I found this while doing a search for 1960s ads, inspired by my love of Mad Men. According to the Muppet Wiki page, Jim Henson was approached by Wilkins coffee to create these 10 second ads. When you subtract the 2 second product shot, he only had 8 seconds to work with. And he brilliantly created two puppets, one who loves Wilkins coffee and one who hates it. Of course, the hater gets destroyed in Muppet-esque fashion in each ad. And the man shot 175 of these from 1957 to 1961.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

It takes so much work to create a lusciously green garden. After almost 4 months of buying plants and gardening every weekend,there's still so much more

I want to do with ours. But the great thing is, no effort is wasted when it comes to working on one's outdoor space. With even just a little work, balconies, terraces and gardens become the better living room in every home that has one.That facade mirror is a genius but risque way to create the illusion of bigger space.